


Dawning Discoveries

by Edo_Hikaro



Series: Defeat Evil With Evil [2]
Category: Bleach, Bleach (adult), Bleach (bidanshi), Bleach (dōjinshi), Bleach (josei)
Genre: Alternate Canon, Anime/Manga Fusion, Anime/Video Game Fusion, Backstory, Canon Related, Canon Universe, Daireishokairou, Deal-making, During Canon, Established Relationship, Father-Son Relationship, Feudalism, Gay Sex, Great Spirit Library, Guardian-Ward Relationship, Investigations, Love, M/M, Mystery, Mysticism, Origin Story, Romance, Seireitei, Sparring, Swordplay, Teacher-Student Relationship, Ugendou, love making
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-07
Updated: 2019-03-07
Packaged: 2019-11-13 06:44:43
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 16,899
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18026753
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Edo_Hikaro/pseuds/Edo_Hikaro
Summary: There, upon the dimly lit green grassy slope, Jyuushirou’s lithe slender figure glowed white and pale blue as he flowed through the complex movements of an ancient Zanjutsu kata. His supple gilded alabaster torso was bare to the waist beneath the flying streams of his long white hair, his long legs encased in the clinging pale blue of his soft worn hakama, one sinewy white hand wielding his slim elegantly curved tachi with effortless ease as he spun, leapt and crouched in seamless grace slicing smooth arcs through the air... [t]he graceful angular fingers of his other hand wove eloquent ribbons of blue-white reiatsu energy burning the morning air with the ozone tang of near lightning as they wreathed his figure in a soundless accompanying dance... As his white mane settled about his wide alabaster shoulders in a fine waterfall, his dark mahogany eyes pierced Shunsui from across the lake.Even from this distance, Shunsui could see it. The slow curving smile full of love. And an invitation.OR READ ENTIRE FINISHED WORK HERE:Defeat Evil With Evil





	Dawning Discoveries

**Author's Note:**

> CHAPTER 2 PLOT TIDBITS!  
> # /Shunsui's scarlet hakama, Jyuushirou's pale blue hakama/ They were of Shunsui's design two thousand years ago and worn by our two protagonists, in Chapter 2 of Part 1 'Unforgivable, Regrettable'.  
> # /the ancient Zanjutsu kata practiced by Jyuushirou, ShunUki dawn twilight sparring / are references to Chapter 2 of Part 1 'Unforgivable, Regrettable'.  
> # /Shunsui's pink flowered kimono/ used to belong to his sister-in-law, Nanao's mother. It's in the manga (Chapter 652, page 14). See here: https://vignette.wikia.nocookie.net/bleach/images/b/bb/652Nanao%27s_mother_entrusts.png/revision/latest?cb=20190106053256&path-prefix=en  
> # /hints of the origins of the Daireishokairou/ begins with references to Yamamoto's private library on the powers of his two wards-turned-sons, at the end of Chapter s of Part 1, 'Unforgivable, Regrettable'.  
> # /Shunsui's dinner reservations/ is following up on his request for Unohana's aid expressed in Chapter 2 of Part 2, 'Heal, To Fight Longer'.

Brightening indigo light slowly crept through the darkness, rousing him to a dim predawn. Surfacing from oblivion he became aware that he was laying alone among cooling dark silk sheets. Sensing the familiar ebbing and flowing of the soft watery reiatsu, he stretched his arm across the empty space, feeling its fading warmth. Inhaling in the lingering scent of peony musk, he emerged into full wakefulness.

In the bluish dimness of the room, he saw that the tatami floor on the other side of the futon was also empty, the familiar long elegant shape of the crimson-hilted tachi nowhere in sight.

Shunsui sat up, the sheets falling to his waist, as his senses reached for the watery reiatsu once more. Immediately he located it in a spot he knew well. The beloved signature eddied in greeting, then unexpectedly, threw him a little splash of invitation.

Surprised, his interest piqued.

That playfulness… when was the last time he felt it?

Silently he rose, heading to the row of hooks on the wall beside the shoji of the master bathroom. His old scarlet hakama hung where he had left it, but its pale-blue partner was no longer hanging beside it, absent, like the crimson-hilted tachi.

A frisson of anticipation ran over his skin and Shunsui could not help curling an anticipatory smile.

The absence of the two items meant only one thing.

Quickly, he took down his scarlet hakama, pulled it on and bound its four-string ties securely about his waist. Taking a hair tie hanging from another hook, he returned to his side of the futon, raking his fingers through his hair as he walked and tying it back into his usual ponytail.

 _Good morning, my dark mistress,_ he greeted as soon as he reached Katen Kyoukotsu, kneeling on one knee to stroke their dark-blue hilts.

There was no answer, save for a low, barely detectable thrum that indicated a deep slumber.

Smirking at the wake-up call he was certain awaited his sleeping zanpakutou, he grasped both weapons in one hand and followed the swirling watery signature out onto the bedroom verandah. Moving around the long low table, he paused before the low wooden balustrade to sweep his gaze over the predawn scenery of the small Ugendou lake.

The ghostly disc of last night’s full moon was sinking into the western horizon. Wisps of clouds, still a dark grey, were gradually paling as the eastern horizon slowly brightened. The dim light was still tinged blue, the cool morning air redolent with fresh greenness and the lingering tang of ozone from the brief lightning shower of last night. His eyes following his senses, he tracked the watery reiatsu to the opposite shore, where a pavilion stood on the rise of the grassy knoll gently ascending from the thin strip of sandy beach.

There, upon the dimly lit green grassy slope, Jyuushirou’s lithe slender figure glowed white and pale blue as he flowed through the complex movements of an ancient Zanjutsu kata. His supple gilded alabaster torso was bare to the waist beneath the flying streams of his long white hair, his long legs encased in the clinging pale blue of his soft worn hakama, one sinewy white hand wielding his slim elegantly curved tachi with effortless ease as he spun, leapt and crouched in seamless grace slicing smooth arcs through the air, every precise stroke whipping a low vibrating sound across the mirror surface of the lake. The graceful angular fingers of his other hand wove eloquent ribbons of blue-white reiatsu energy burning the morning air with the ozone tang of near lightning as they wreathed his figure in a soundless accompanying dance. On one bare foot he spun and crouched, long blade slicing a horizontal arc before his body, one long pale-blue clad leg sweeping its bare pale foot over jadeite grass sending sheets of glistening raindrops and dew spraying into the air, and as he spun away the shining crystalline drops fell showering down upon the glassy surface of the lake in a soft scattering rain, blurring its mirror smoothness. Reaching the end of the movement, he paused in a half-crouching stance, lithely balanced on the toes of one foot beneath one folded knee, his other leg extended to the side with his bare foot lightly resting on the wet grass, long tachi folded behind his bare torso against his supple gilded arm, his other palm cradling a soundlessly flaming ball of blue white-reiatsu. As his white mane settled about his wide alabaster shoulders in a fine waterfall, his dark mahogany eyes pierced Shunsui from across the lake.

Even from this distance, he could see it. The slow, curving smile full of love. And an invitation.

Shunsui smiled slowly in response, his senses and body stirring, his instincts rising to the silent challenge.

Releasing a small layer of his own reiatsu, he lifted one bare foot, leapt onto the top of the low balustrade, then launched himself upwards and forwards into the predawn air. Curving in an arc towards the middle of the lake, he pointed his bare toes downwards as he descended towards the still rippling surface of the water, pushing his reiatsu downwards and leaving one ripple behind as the borrowed force buoyed him into a second arc, propelling him upwards and forwards once more before delivering him in a light descent landing him on the edge of the knoll. Thick carpeted damp grass flattened beneath his bare feet as he drew both swords. Dropping their sheaths on the grassy cushion, he leapt into the air in a Bushougoma spin, directing his trajectory down at his fey opponent below.

Jyuushirou spun away in swirl of white and pale blue, leaving behind a ribbon of reiatsu that repelled his blades. Shunsui landed on the grass in a crouch swinging both his blades to his side after his opponent, his blade winds blowing fresh sprays of rain and dew drops up around them, slicing upwards to meet the downward arcing long curved tachi, their three blades ringing sharply in the quiet of the brightening predawn as they struck, steel to steel, Jyuushirou’s dark gaze flashing with playful challenge as their eyes momentarily locked over their engaged blades, then with a steely slithering sound they slid apart, his fair willowy figure slanting into a new kata as without a word, his single tachi blurred then peeled apart into a pair of identical long swords, each bearing a backwards arcing secondary blade from its back, both linked at the hilt by a length of crimson silken rope from which suspended five metal talismans that chimed like bells in the silence of the rising dawn. In response Shunsui crossed his blades and swept them down each other as he spun into a low sweeping attack, his daishou pair of black scimitars springing forth as he sliced them through the air handspans above the grass aiming for the slender pale-blue clad legs. Those legs leapt above his horizontal strikes, bare white feet spraying shining droplets into his vision, and he followed through slanting upwards in double-bladed slice, a palm’s breadth behind the flying pale figure who suddenly sank beneath his strike, his scimitars passing harmlessly above the white-haired head. Twin long swords began twirling asymmetrically in pale supple hands, sending a wave of reiatsu sweeping around the knoll, gusting loose leaves and crystalline water drops into the skies and rippling the glass surface of the lake. Shunsui accompanied with simultaneous forward and backward jabs of his double scimitars, piercing the reiatsu wave with slicing layers of his own force that blew and bent the bamboo groves around the knoll without cutting a single jadeite stalk.

Delighted laughter tinkled above him, ringing like bells in the predawn light.

Looking up, Shunsui could not help an aroused smile at the sight, his loins stirring. Jyuushirou stood easily reiatsu-stepping in midair, half-turned towards the still swaying bamboo grove, long white mane flowing down his shoulders and back, one long blade was folded against the back of his slender supple arm. The back of the other blade rested over one bare sloping shoulder as he looked back down at Shunsui, his dark eyes glimmering with silent teasing beneath a raised long arching black brow, a half-smile playing on his small sculpted mouth. With a lopsided curl of his lips and a whipping swathe of long white hair he turned away and before Shunsui could shout out in caution, his lithe figure leapt right onto the top of the precariously _swaying_ bamboo thicket, lightly skipping unerringly from unsteady stalk to unsteady stalk, throwing another glance over his shoulder with a quick inviting grin.

Barking out a laugh as he caught on, Shunsui loosed his reiatsu into his legs then buoyed himself upwards and forwards, one leg stretching out to tap his foot on a swaying leaf, then the other leg stretching out to tap his other foot on another swaying leaf, stretching and scissoring his strides in quick succession as he leapt from waving bamboo stalk to waving bamboo stalk in pursuit of the nimble willowy figure flashing white and pale blue through the green unsteady canopy ahead. Silvery merry laughter floated back to him on the speeding winds, wringing forth his own chuckles, his mirth whipping away in the winds as he plunged through the dangerously bending and colliding bamboo stalks, jadeite leaves and trunks sinking and rising and yielding unpredictably beneath his feet from their passing reiatsu. Senses sharpening into blade points to keep his balance he chased his incredibly agile target through the tall waving jade-green stalks as he tried to keep sight of his fey fleet-footed quarry. Then a soft tell-tale snick sent him rolling forwards instinctively, missing a toppling bamboo stalk, sliced in half by an unseen blade. Unfurling from his roll, he rose to a crouch on the soft moist soil, sweeping his eyes up and around in one searching glance, and abruptly sensing more than seeing an oncoming wavelet of salty ozone-tinged reiatsu, he spun, leading with his shorter scimitar, following with his longer scimitar sweeping up from below, only to see bare white feet leaping up and a somersaulting blur of white and pale blue rising clear of his strike. There was a metallic ringing and then the blur solidified into the form of Jyuushirou, descending downwards with his knees drawn up, his arms sweeping both long swords apart to his either side, sending a cutting wave slicing downwards to Shunsui. Raising both scimitars he slashed them down vertically, splitting the wave into half feeling his skin tingle as both halves sped harmlessly past his arms and sides, cracking bamboo and tearing fallen leaves behind him. With a rakish grin, he leapt towards Jyuushirou, intent on catching him before his bare white feet could touch the ground.

Laughing in answer, Jyuushirou simply threw up one leg leading himself into an upwards body flip, clearing past Shunsui overhead with both long swords folded behind his arms. Landing on top of one bamboo stalk, he flashed a grin, then turned and _ran_ , leaping from bending stalk to bending stalk, long white hair streaming out behind him. Shunsui pursued swiftly, tossing his scimitars in midair to change his hold into backhanded grips as his feet rapidly tapped from leaf to stalk to trunk to leaf, closing in on the blurry fleeing shape ahead darting white and pale blue over the jadeite canopy. Then suddenly they were running out of bamboo grove, and Jyuushirou’s lithe form dropped to the grassy knoll twirling his twin long swords asymmetrically drawing twin ribbons of entwining reiatsu currents in his wake. Crossing his arms Shunsui sliced both outward edges of his scimitars across the reiatsu barrier cutting himself an entry gap, leaping through it and landing on the grass only to feel the currents close behind him immediately again. Jyuushirou turned, double long blades slashing horizontally. With a quick flip of his wrists Shunsui spun his hilts and his scimitars in forward grips again, caught the double blow. Four blades met in one single resounding ring, and he stared into blazing laughing dark eyes, his vision momentarily shielded under flying streams of long white hair.

Finely carved lips splitting into a mischievous smile, Jyuushirou shoved, then they were sliding apart with another singular, sharp metallic slithering ring. Before Shunsui could cease his backwards momentum Jyuushirou flipped and somersaulted backwards until he landed on the edge of the roof of the small pavilion, then pushing off on his bare feet, launched into a reiatsu-run through the air ringing around Shunsui, twin long swords drawing currents of salty ozone-tinged reiatsu in a trailing barrier. Shunsui followed his speeding trajectory slashing one scimitar after the other sending successive slices of cutting force after the slender agile form, spinning in place to keep his airborne opponent in his line of attack as his blurry flying pale target kept just ahead of his strikes layering on streams of heaving reiatsu waves about them. In a few heartbeats they were enclosed in the centre of a spacious cage of invisible undulating energy, and suddenly the speeding figure solidified into Jyuushirou’s form dropping lightly as a leaf onto the grass, white hands sealing his twin blades back into a single tachi, one palm rising and throwing a stream of blue-white reiatsu at the encircling currents of energy, igniting it into a glowing bluish-white light barrier and obscuring their surroundings. Then Jyuushirou stood still and stared intensely at Shunsui, his long white hair blown and tousled, his dark eyes alive and afire, neither winded, nor beaded with a single drop of sweat, his high cheekbones blooming with the glow of his power as the smile curving his fine lips became sultry, welcoming.

Sealing his scimitars and reiatsu, Shunsui clapped both his hilts into one hand and closing the distance between them in one stride, reached out his freed hand and clasped the back Jyuushirou’s head, pulling him in brusquely as his mouth clamped over the teasing pale-pink lips with a low growl of conquest. Vaguely he heard the drop of a sword onto the grass as lithe supple arms rose and wrapped like warm yielding steel bands about his neck, strong sinewy fingers threading through his hair. Dropping his own swords, Shunsui bore Jyuushirou backwards onto the soft grass, his mouth slanting hard across the soft sweet lips, his tongue prying them open and plunging into the warm surrendering cavern beneath, the musk of peony, grass and salty ozone-tinged reiatsu intoxicating his senses as his hands roughly, clumsily pulled at the ties of the pale-blue hakama about the slender waist. He almost tore the soft well-worn fabric in his haste, stripping it down the flat supple abdomen to the gently swelling lean hips, the newly healed skin creamy and white without a single marring injury. White angular fingers fumbled and pulled urgently at Shunsui’s scarlet hakama ties, and with mutual rustles of fabric, they were both nude. Then Shunsui proceeded to make possessive, ardent love to the fey, tantalising heart of his soul right then and there, on the dew carpeted grass under the brightening dawn, in a ring of cool blue-white reiatsu light.

Jyuushirou arched and cried beneath him, throwing back his fine beautiful head arching the slender vulnerability of his white throat to Shunsui’s demanding kisses, his long, toned legs snapping about Shunsui with steely strength, his lithe body heaving and straining with hunger for fulfilment. Shunsui answered his demands heave for heave, rapidly pumping Jyuushirou to ejaculation, caging the head of Jyuushirou’s throbbing elegant manhood in one palm to capture the thick scalding streams. Then messily, hurriedly, he slathered himself and in one aggressive thrust pierced into the hungry willing pale body, still pliant and open from their passion last night, swallowing Jyuushirou’s shout of pleasure in his mouth as he slid back and thrust, slid back and thrust, and slid back again and thrust again over and over the throbbing nerve centre inside the clenching quivering passage, his rhythm rapidly quickening until he was pounding uncontrollably, pounding feverishly, Jyuushirou's supple strength meeting him thrust for thrust for thrust with ravenous iron force, his impassioned cries muffled beneath Shunsui’s relentless, consuming mouth, his hands and fingers clenching deep and hard over Shunsui’s back. Then he was coming again between them for the second time, and a heartbeat later Shunsui shouted and shuddered his release deep inside, deep within the clenching clasping depths of his fey, strong, beautiful love and soul brother.

They fell apart together, panting, sticky and dishevelled, exhausted and messy from their passion instead of their sparring. The reiatsu flames dimmed and dissipated around them, revealing the grassy knoll and bamboo grove once again. Laying panting on the damp grass, as one they turned their heads and looked at each other, then without warning, burst into laughter. Jyuushirou’s peals of mirth rang carefree and unrestrained through the air, as light and happy as that day two thousand years ago when Shunsui showed him his shikai for the first time.

Counting his laughter from last evening when Kurosaki-kun had made him laugh, Shunsui realised he had not heard his soul brother express so much joy in so short a time for several hundred years.

Then he realised something else. “That’s two days in a row we released shikai!” Shunsui sniggered, grinning madly.

Dark eyes widened, then crinkled with answering mirth. “Yes!” gasped Jyuushirou, his pale shoulders shaking at the ridiculousness of their situation.

“What must Yama-jii think!” Shunsui chortled with glee.

Another silvery peal from Jyuushirou joined him in commiseration, and they both collapsed again into laughter, feeling once again like two errant boys conspiring to vex their sensei and adoptive father.

Shunsui rolled onto his side, still cackling as he gazed fondly at his snickering soul brother, whose entire frame was still quaking with mirth. “Ai, hundreds of years of no shikai, and now we’re deluging his senses every day!”

Gasping until he subsided enough to speak, Jyuushirou turned his face towards Shunsui and grinned impishly. “We will probably send Sensei back into his private library,” he snickered softly. “He does so love to study our powers.”

“Let him guess at this one then,” Shunsui quipped, flinging himself onto his back once more, throwing his arms out haphazardly on either side. “He started it yesterday, toying with our zanpakutou the way he did.”

Above him, the dome of the predawn sky was almost bright. Their sparring and shunpo tag had taken them to the cusp of sunrise.

“Come,” Jyuushirou finally said, sitting up. With another soft snicker, he flowed to his feet and stark naked, curtained only by his long gleaming white mane, he ran lightly down the grassy knoll like a magical yousei, and in one leap, two, his elegant body sliced head first into the lake like a glowing white carp with a crystalline plop. The water rippled after his disappearance, and lazily, Shunsui waited.

And waited.

When the ripples continued expanding and fading, he quickly sat up and scanned the lake surface anxiously. As the ripples continued expanding undisturbed, he tensed to go after his love when abruptly, a white gleaming head burst through the rippling lake surface, long hair throwing back a shining sheets of crystalline water.

Laughing to himself in relief, Shunsui rose and more sedately, followed. Walking nude and barefoot until he left the grass and felt sand beneath his feet, he waded into the cool water and began stroking steadily, powerfully towards Jyuushirou, turning to float on his back to scrub his skin with his hands underwater. Soft hands moved through his hair and scalp, and he smiled appreciatively at the upside-down image of Jyuushirou, inhaling a sharp breath when the sun finally broke into a new day and dusted his love’s damp alabaster skin with a luminous pale gold.

Splashing about and treading water so that he was facing Jyuushirou, Shunsui slowly, lovingly, placed a kiss on those wet, pale-pink lips, expressing without words what he felt in his heart for the one soul who knew all layers of darkness within him and loved him even more for it. Jyuushirou kissed him back softly, deep understanding in his dark eyes as shining water droplets beaded on his long lashes. Then with a grin, he began stroking gracefully back to shore, towards where their discarded hakama and weapons lay, his fair skin flashing like a pale golden carp in the dawning rays of the sun. 

# # # # # #

The exact nature of the brief lightning shower last night could only be understood by those who knew well the one who summoned it.

Thus it came as a surprise to Shunsui that one particular high-seated Thirteenth Division officer had picked it up.

It was a slender bespectacled young man of average height, with light-purple hair of medium-length combed back from his face. Shunsui recognised him as the Sixth Seat of the Thirteenth, but for the life of him could not remember the officer's name. The Sixth Seat was in the middle of a slight commotion on the shore at the end of the narrow bridge linking the pavilion lake house to the main land. It seemed that Kiyone-chan and Sentaro-san had discharged themselves early in the morning and now found themselves barred from seeing their taichou by their bespectacled junior colleague. As Shunsui trailed behind Jyuushirou over the narrow bridge, their arguments rose in volume, testament to the unique culture of the Thirteenth that juniors could argue against seniors, as long as the argument had merits.

And from what Shunsui was overhearing of his explanations to his irate superiors, the Sixth Seat had sound merits to his argument. The young man was clearly flustered at being outranked but nevertheless was firmly standing his ground.

“…isn’t that Taichou is not well! Truly! Last night wasn’t a stray reiatsu release due to illness!” argued the young man. _Kajoumaru,_ Shunsui suddenly recalled his family name. “Neither was this morning!”

“ **And how would you know!?** ” Sentaro-san boomed with furious demand. “ **You haven’t served Taichou as closely and long as us!** ”

“Let us pass!” cried Kiyone-chan, her face streaked with exasperation and anxiety. “When Taichou accidentally releases reiatsu like that it means he’s very ill!”

“Trust me, it wasn’t an accident!” Kajoumaru tried again with urgency. “Taichou needs the utmost privacy right now!”

Shunsui slanted a humorous glance to his side, seeing a fine crease wrinkle the otherwise unlined pale brow of his love.

Unfortunately, before he could comfort his love, their arrival was noticed.

“Ukitake Taichou! Kyouraku Taichou!”

“ **Ukitake Taichou! Kyouraku Taichou!** ”

“Ukitake Taichou, Kyouraku Taichou.”

The three greetings came at them at various volumes in a disjointed chorus, two of them surprised, one flustered.

“Good morning,” Jyuushirou returned, his deep lyrical tenor calm and gentle as always, but held a clear hint of trepidation.

Shunsui decided to spare a moment to watch the curious drama.

“ **Taichou, are you well?** ” Sentaro-san’s worried voice reverberated around the early morning Ugendou. “ **We felt your reiatsu release-** ” He stopped suddenly, his eyes widening in confusion at Jyuushirou’s apparent health.

“Taichou, did you have an episode?” Kiyone-chan was equally confused, her grey eyes darting from Jyuushirou to Shunsui and back.

“Taichou, I keep trying to explain that you should not be disturbed…” Kajoumaru trailed off, his bespectacled eyes glancing discreetly at Shunsui.

“Please, everyone,” soothed Jyuushirou as he held out his slender hand placatingly.

His voice and manner calmed his highly strung subordinates like a balm of cool water. Immediately, the three officers subsided into respectful silence. Turning to Kajoumaru, Jyuushirou smiled kindly and with soft gratitude, praised, “Thank you, Hidetomo, you are indeed astute.”

His light skin turning red, the Sixth Seat bowed. He gave Shunsui another discreet glance, opened his mouth to add something more, then shut it again wordlessly as he seemed to think better of it.

Shunsui took no offence at the surreptitious glances. He understood the two Third Seats’ anxiety, for they had both served Jyuushirou for more than half a century and knew well that Shunsui spent his nights at the Ugendou to care for their taichou whenever a long bout struck. What they had yet to learn was that for nearly fifteen hundred years now, Jyuushirou’s control rarely slipped. And he was mildly impressed that the unassuming studious-looking Sixth Seat had figured it out when his more experienced superiors had not.

“I apologise for being presumptuous, Taichou,” Kajoumaru was apologising. “It’s just that I was extremely certain that you… are well.”

“I am well, indeed,” Jyuushirou chuckled. Looking at his Third Seats, he asked in concern, “But are _you_ two well?”

“We’ve recovered, Ukitake Taichou!” they answered simultaneously, then glared at each other.

“ **We came immediately when we felt your reiatsu!** ” Sentaro-san boomed anxiously, still confused by the fact that Jyuushirou did not appear ill.

Understanding abruptly dawned on Kiyone-chan’s gamine face. “ _Ai!_ ” She started flushing deeply. “I-we-I’m sorry, Ukitake Taichou! We should not be disturbing you! Come on Sentaro, we should leave now!” She began tugging urgently at the sleeve of her co-Third Seat as she began moving away.

Kajoumaru bowed again and prepared to follow his superior officers.

“Wait, please,” Jyuushirou called to them.

Turning his back to his officers, Jyuushirou looked at him wordlessly for a heartbeat, then a small intimate smile curved his lips. Lowering his lashes, his cheeks blooming faintly pink, he murmured in a hushed lyrical voice that remained only between them, “Last night… and this dawn… they are very special to me…”

Shunsui’s heart stopped, then stuttered up again, his blood stirred by the demurely shy confession.

Unaware of his effect on Shunsui, Jyuushirou lifted his dark eyes, his warmth and caring shining in their depths. “I may be delayed by my duties today… but I can have our kitchens serve your evening repast here for your return. Our chef recently created a new sushi dish…”

“Let’s share that together another time?” Shunsui put in softly, reaching up a hand to touch the finely chiselled face, then dropping it at the last instant when he recalled they had an audience. “As much as I would love to, I have something I need to do tonight, remember?” His arms ached with need to fold Jyuushirou back into his embrace.

Jyuushirou brightened as he visibly recalled Shunsui’s private arrangement with Hanshi-sama yesterday. Curiosity flashed briefly in his expression but he did not pursue. Instead, he looked hopefully at Shunsui, the memory of their recent passions lingering in his dark eyes. “Then… will I see you when you return?”

Resisting another urge to touch the beautiful angular face, Shunsui hid his impulse with a dip of his hat. “I shall be back before you fall asleep,” he confirmed softly, allowing his eyes to say what his lips could not.

Smiling with pleasure, Jyuushirou nodded slightly and with barely perceptible reluctance, turned back to his waiting subordinates. He gently gestured with unconscious graceful authority. “Could all of you accompany me to my office? We have much to do today.” With a backward smile and a nod of farewell at Shunsui, he stepped from the bridge onto the pebbled shore and began to lead his officers away.

Shunsui watched Jyuushirou’s tall lithe form leave with silent longing, missing him already. Not for the first time, he imagined that someday, they would both find a place where they could be together forever, without interruptions.

Secreting his emotions deep into the centre of his soul, he released the barest force of reiatsu and launched himself towards the eastern boundary walls of the Ugendou.

For now, he needed Jyuushirou to be occupied while he pursued the idea that had formed during his sleep. 

# # # # # #

The Eighth Division headquarters lay east of the Ugendou, in the north-northeastern quadrant of the Seireitei. That entire quadrant was originally allocated to Shunsui, and the east-northeastern quadrant to the Fifth. But by the fifth century of moving into the Seireitei, as he slackened off on recruitment while Jyuushirou continued to receive more applications than he could manage, Shunsui had simply ceded half of the Eighth’s territory to the Thirteenth and thus solved both their problems: Jyuushirou suddenly had new roles and territories for his excess recruits and Shunsui no longer needed justify to Yama-jii why he was failing to meet his recruitment quotas. Of course, his old sensei had never let him forget that he had creatively taken the easy way out, but Shunsui had long ago ceased to argue. He would recruit only when the right candidates appeared rather than force himself to fulfil artificial requirements. Besides, he always believed that it was more important that the Seireitei’s first lines of defence be stronger than its secondary lines of resistance. If they kept their outermost perimeters, they could go on the offensive rather than have to fight fires after the enemy had broken past their boundaries.

But that was physical defence of the Seireitei. Dealing with enemies he could see with concrete military and defence strategies was his especial domain. When it came to enemies he could not see, Shunsui was less sure of himself. As he took a sedate contemplative pace back to his quarters, consciously planning the steps to unearth Kurotsuchi’s secrets in those tall cylindrical tanks, that part of him which was the sleepless shinigami warrior took the opportunity to rise unbidden to the fore and send his thoughts mulling over his exchange with Yoruichi, and his sense memory recalling the strangely mixed reiatsu emanating from Kurosaki-kun. Like rapidly flitting images he backtracked over the events of the past week, and the directions of his musing mind began to arouse that tingling on all his instincts he immediately recognised. By the time he crossed the boundary walls of his own division, Shunsui was in a semi-state of alert, his brain whirling with a morass of ideas, memories, thoughts and questions both official and private until he almost ran into the bustling wagon line of shinigami, Rukongai workers and trundling carts of construction materials and tools.

Flash-stepping out of the way into the lee of a protruding eave, he paused to watch the commotion for several heartbeats. Those shinigami were his own officers, and they were completely preoccupied with supervising the transportation of the wagon line towards the destroyed courtyard of the Eighth where he had duelled with Sado-kun. Most of the wagons bore slabs of new, white masonry stones. There was that quality of organised chaos and noise about the avenue which were totally incomprehensible to him and, quite frankly, scared him. Clearly, Nanao-chan truly meant business when she said she wanted him out of the way while repairs were being done.

Deciding it was best he keep away from his subordinates and their business, Shunsui cloaked his reiatsu completely and sought another way back to his private quarters, leaping from roof to roof in a circuitous route to avoid being seen and, if anyone were to ask him, to stay out of something he knew he had no capability for. It took him nearly half an hour to make it to his private quarters, and when he finally did, he entered his personal space with a sigh of relief.

“Good morning, Kyouraku Taichou.”

He almost jumped.

Nanao-chan was waiting for him in his living room, a stack of papers in her hand. Her face was stony but there was a smirk in her blue violet-tinged eyes behind her spectacles as she deliberately lowered the reiatsu-masking technique he had recently taught her.

She had ambushed him with paperwork.

For a heartbeat, Shunsui regretted imparting that particular skill to her. Then guiltily banished the selfish thought.

“Good morning, lovely Nanao-chan!” he returned jovially. Before he could even take a step into his own quarters, those dreaded papers were suddenly under his nose.

“I just need you to sign these acquisition forms. The materials and workers are arriving today, and we need to pay the suppliers.”

After several decades of having his niece take over as his fukutaichou, he had learnt that when she was serious enough to accost him in his private quarters with paperwork, it was far better for his continued peace that he attended to it immediately rather than procrastinate like he normally would.

Gingerly accepting the papers, he flashed a smile at her then made himself read through them, becoming utterly impressed despite himself as he leafed through each sheet until he reached the last form. 

The suppliers were the finest masonries in the First District of North Rukongai who exclusively served high nobility. Yet they were offering an unusually generous credit line despite their reputation of being cutthroat in their prices and snobbish in their attitudes simply because of their elite clientele.

“How did you get them to agree to this?” he said wonderingly, looking at her with some amazement.

She creased her brow at him, then lifted one brow over the frame of her glasses. “Sometimes, Kyouraku Taichou, you forget your own status.”

Oh.

“But it also means we need to uphold your reputation by paying on time. Which means signing these requisition forms on time. Such as signing them  _now_.” Her last word was entirely steely.

Smiling ruefully, Shunsui asked no more and obediently signed all the places helpfully marked out with colourful bits of sticky paper. He did not bother to check the cost calculations. If he did, he was certain he would mess up an impeccable and sophisticated system that she had undoubtedly put in place. A rule of good leadership, he firmly believed, was knowing when to stay out of the way of more capable subordinates and let them do their jobs. And if that subordinate was capable enough to do the work of a taichou, then was it not all the merrier for all?  

“There!” He handed back the duly signed stack with a proud flourish.

“Thank you, Kyouraku Taichou.” She took the sheaf, checked through them quickly, then satisfied, tucked them under her arm a visibly pleased look. Casting a look towards his bedroom, she informed, “I've hung out your spare kimono out. I couldn’t pack it in the bundle last evening because the silk will be crushed. If you could give me the one that you’re wearing now, I can bring it to the silk master to have the soot stains removed.”

She had read his mind.

Shrugging his treasured flowered pink silk kimono off his shoulders, he folded it in half and handed the cherished robe to her. “Ai, Nanao-chan, you understand me too well,” he rumbled fondly.

“This was my mother’s,” she replied simply, carefully draping the stained kimono over her arm, then prepared to leave. The gentling of her stern demeanour was only slightly perceptible when she asked, “Will you be moving back here after this week? That lightning rain last night…”

So she had figured it out as well. Shunsui did not need to think about his answer, however. “I can’t leave just yet,” he answered honestly.

It was a testament to her understanding of him that the only response she made was to push her glasses farther up on her nose. “Then I'll prepare and send over more of your clothes. And see you in the office during the day.”

“Thank you, Nanao-chan,” he smiled gratefully at her. Then added, “And more of my stash as well.”

She frowned. “I'm _quite_ certain Ukitake Taichou  _does not_  prefer you drunk all the time,” she said with sharp meaning.

He affected a wounded look. “Me? Drunk?”

Rolling her eyes, she made her way towards the door, throwing back one last line over her shoulder. “My report and Enjouji’s report will be ready for your review in two days. Enjouji is recovering well and is able to write already.”

“I’ll look at them when they’re ready.” He waved cheerfully at her in acknowledgement, ignoring her sceptical look as she left and drew the shoji shut behind her.

Chuckling silently to himself, he walked into his bedroom. His private quarters were the standard taichou apartments, and he mostly used it for storing his personal things and sake stash rather than for sleeping. Shunsui could sleep anywhere. Over a millennium and a half of hard campaigning had ensured that. And guaranteed that he had very few keepsakes from avoiding attachments to anyone or anything. He had no need for other memento when his one true treasure was alive and well in his life every day and in his arms every night.

There was one thing, however, that he secreted in his private quarters for security.

The spare kimono was hanging ready on its stand, as Nanao-chan had said. It was slightly different from the one he had kept from among the personal effects of his late Ise Onee-sama, but close enough of a replica that he would continue to keep in character in the eyes of the public. Leaving it for the moment, he moved to the floor at the farthest corner of his bedroom and dropping to his haunches, lifted the tatami to uncover the floorboard underneath. The kidou seal hummed in greeting at his approach, Jyuushirou had helped him weave it so that it responded only to Shunsui’s reiatsu signature. Unfurling a little reiatsu, he let it recognise him, then as soon as the barrier parted, he lifted the floorboard and removed the mechanical black butterfly laying in the compartment beneath. At another touch of his reiatsu, the delicate construct moved, slowly lifting and lowering its wings once, awakening from dormancy.

He had an old low-ranking steward in the Kyouraku Estate who was formerly a high-level adjutant in the Gotei. Shunsui had persuaded Yama-jii to allow the shinigami a dishonourable discharge and sealing of powers in lieu of execution, for in his view the former adjutant’s crime had been one of superciliousness and overconfidence rather than evil intent, despite its near fatal consequences. Shunsui had taken the disgraced officer into the Kyouraku Clan in exchange for serving as his personal eyes and ears on his clan members, and at times, carrying out matters which he preferred to keep from his clan’s knowledge. If Yama-jii knew of this private arrangement, his old sensei made no mention of it.

His message to the mechanical butterfly was simple. Send a batch of the Kyouraku estate honey from the peony gardens to the Eighth by this afternoon, and make a dinner reservation for two tonight at a particular [ryoutei](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ry%C5%8Dtei) whose proprietor owed Shunsui a favour and would keep strict confidence about his visit. Then carrying the construct to the window, he powered it with his reiatsu and watched as it took flight into the early morning light, resembling a Jigokuchou in all ways except for the fact that it was a purely mechanical thing and could be detected by those without reiryoku.

Private errand completed, Shunsui resealed the floorboard over the now empty compartment and replaced the tatami, then straightened to his feet. He moved to the kimono stand and removing the new kimono carefully, pulled it on over his shoulders as he left his bedroom.

The ideas congealed in his subconscious last night had risen to the forefront of his mind in vague, indistinct blotches. Coupled with his instincts on high alert from his contemplation of all that had recently happened to them and the Seireitei, his thoughts were now even more disorderly. There was something just beyond his mental grasp, eluding him every time he reached for it. And whenever he found himself with such a messy unsettled head, he needed a proper conversation with his zanpakutou.

However, to hold a proper conversation with Katen Kyoukotsu meant that he had to go into that half-meditative state which, if anyone happened to look at him, they would think he was snoozing off another heavy drink. It was how he had gained a reputation for being the resident alcoholic sloth of the Gotei. He never once minded the mistaken impression, since he was honest enough with himself to admit that he did love sake.

The cherry wood sideboard in his living room was a relatively new piece of furniture, added to store his private stash of Kyouraku Reserve within his convenient reach. Ever since he started the collection it seldom ran low and never once ran empty. Restocks tended to mysteriously appear before either emergency could arise. For the longest time he thought it was Lisa who kept him in constant supply, and after he lost Lisa, he thought it was Nanao-chan who took over her predecessor’s duty. He had even gone so far as to tease both of them about their farce of keeping up a public disapproval of his constant imbibing. But the first time a rare selection of Ukitake plum vintage appeared among his cache eighty years ago, he suddenly understood who it was who had been keeping him in an unceasing supply of alcohol.

That rare, contrastingly piquant and sweet plum vintage never lasted long once they appeared in his stock. Regretfully, he had none of it left now. Wistfully plucking out two fresh bottles of his usual, he held them by the string handles around their necks and left his private quarters, stepping onto the corridor outside.

A light leap onto the corridor balustrade, followed by another leap upwards, brought him to the opposite rooftop. Lightly he trod along the peak of the roof until he arrived at his favourite shaded spot, right under the overhang of the second storey where the roof tiles were kept suspiciously clean for him. Settling down cross-legged, he slid Katen Kyoukotsu from his obi and balanced them across his lap, then placed one bottle beside him. The other, he uncorked and took a swig.

While not the Ukitake plum vintage, the current batch of his estate’s reserve was still excellent. He made a mental note to congratulate the brew master in his next note home and took a few more swigs, slowly allowing the alcohol to burn into his bloodstream and warm him from within.

Someone unknown to him had decided a long time ago that the Academy would teach that the only way to imprint on one’s asauchi and after that communicate with one’s zanpakutou was through jinzen. Shunsui never found out who was the one who decided so, because to him it was inflexible and an overly limited form of martial instruction. For starters, jinzen never worked for him. The first time he tried it, over a thousand years ago, his zanpakutou had turned up her snooty nose, went silent and that was that. Through his subsequent centuries of hard warfare, he could only ever talk to her in her preferred way, which was when he was liberally doused with sake until he was halfway to inebriation.

A couple of swallows of his first bottle was not going to send him to that zone any time soon.

Which was why he jumped and nearly dropped his bottle at her sudden voice.

[ _I’m listening._ ]

Quickly he collected himself, quite shocked. _Yare, yare! This is the first time you don’t need me to drink myself into a stupor!_

[ _I was awake before daybreak. And waiting for you to talk._ ]

_Truly?_

[ _You want proof now?_ ] she snorted.

He hurried to assure her.  _No, no, no. I’m just really shocked. What gives? You usually take me nearly two bottles before you’ll even deign to acknowledge me._

[ _After that most stimulating wake-up call? I can hardly return to sleep now, can I._ ] There was an entirely inappropriate licentious tone in her voice.

 _Ooooooooooh, I **see** ,_ he sniggered mentally. She would never admit to it, but she had a secret vice for the illicit voyeur’s thrill of spying on his intimacy with Jyuushirou.

_If I knew this was another way to get you into a talkative mood, I would’ve employed it centuries ago. And save Hanshi-sama a lot of work repairing my liver._

[ _Oh you always knew. You were just too jealous to share,_ ] she sniffed. [ _I hope you know why you’re sharing now._ ]

When she put it that way, it sounded ridiculous. She was a part of his soul. So it followed that it was completely illogical that he could be jealous of himself.

 _What, no terrorising me with threats? Going straight to the point?_  he teased to hide his discomfiture.

[ _You should be the one to talk. You know as well as I do why you’re talking to me this seriously. Speak. I may be your zanpakutou, but I can’t always read your mind._ ]

_And here I was just thinking how illogical it is that you think I can jealous of you, who’re a part of me. Aren’t we the same soul? You should know everything I know, ne?_

[ _I much prefer for us to keep our separate individualities, thank you._ ]

She had a point. Whatever he still retained of the innate placidity that came with his being born as a pure soul, he preferred to keep. To become anything like her was… a little too much to take. Even for him.

He scratched his stubble as he tried to frame his chaotic thoughts into some semblance of order.  _I’m disturbed, yet excited,_  he tried experimentally.

She remained silent, waiting.

_I think it has to do with everything that’ve surfaced since Aizen was exposed. My instincts are itching._

[ _Why do you think?_ ]

 _It’s the confluence of events,_  he pondered, trying to identify the exact thing that had his instincts rising in hackles.  _Everything that’s come to light, and likely still coming to light, they’re simply… well, too coincidental. And the things I'm discovering myself… I went to Mayuri to find out what he did to that Quincy boy, but instead found a sliver of hope for Jyuushirou and I. Aizen had been scheming against the Gotei for a long time, yet it had to take someone with powers as strangely mixed as Kurosaki-kun to expose him._

[ _And you’ve never believed in coincidences,_ ] she concluded for him.

And he realised, that was it. The root of all his unease. Chuckling, he rewarded himself with a few satisfying swigs.  _Why can’t all our conversations be this efficient?_

[ _Why can’t you share him with me more often?_ ] she retorted, half-sneering, half-wistful.

At her words, he felt a possessiveness overcome him. It was ludicrous but there it was. He was possessive over Jyuushirou even against his own soul, his own zanpakutou.  _My dark mistress,_  he began, masking his feelings by trying to sound understanding. _He’s the most beautiful thing in all realms, and I let you peek on us because you’re a part of me. But never forget that he’s a warrior with a strong soul and an even stronger will. I won’t ever disrespect him sharing him around like a plaything, if that’s what you’re after. And frankly, I doubt his zanpakutou intrudes upon his privacy the way you intrude upon mine._

[ _They care more about their own fun than his well-being,_ ] she scoffed with disdain. Then lewdly, teased, [ _Oh you **are**  a territorial one. That Shihouin woman is right on the kan about you._]

Her last sentence hit a little too close to his heart, hence he deliberately ignored it.  _I see you talk to his zanpakutou behind my back._

[ _It’s hard not to when their rowdiness gets on my nerves._ ]

 _Why is that they’re a pair, and you’re only one of you?_  he genuinely wondered.

[ _I like manifesting as a pair. You like it too._ ]

_Well, yes. But I’m still curious. Don’t get me wrong, having one of you inside me is more than I can handle, so I’m not wanting another one of you. I’m just wondering how this could have happened._

[ _To be honest, even I don’t know. When you first called me, I came. And there I was, in a pair. And it feels right, though I don’t know the reason._ ]

He drank more sake, thinking.  _I don’t think they care so little for him. They respond to him much better than you respond to me, so he must have a way with them we don’t know about. Still, their relationships is none of our business. We’ve no place in their private bond._

[ _As you wish,_ ] she replied archly, then fell silent, clearing no longer wishing to speak.

Shunsui continued to sit and drink, allowing his mind to wander and look at the questions and hunches floating through the forefront of his thoughts, entering into that half-conscious wakeful state where his thinking coagulated best.

Eventually he was able to fit his scattered thoughts into a more coherent string of reasoning.

It seemed much too coincidental that Aizen, who kept his machinations carefully hidden for a full century with none the wiser, who had been experimenting with a power device that could break the barriers between shinigami and Hollow, would finally be exposed by the actions of one fifteen-year-old human whose reiryoku felt like a mixture of shinigami, Hollow and Quincy, and whose reiatsu signature so resembled Shiba Isshin who was the first among the Gotei to encounter a shinigami-like Hollow called White in Naruki City almost two decades ago, and whose physical appearance was almost a mirror image of Shiba Kaien who was killed by the Hollow called Metastacia which could mask its reiatsu like a shinigami. Equally coincidental was that the human youth had brought with him a young friend whose reiatsu reeked of Hollow tang, and another young friend who was a Quincy, a race that was supposedly extinct. And it was entirely too inexplicable that Urahara Kisuke, who was exiled to the Living World for supposedly messing with Hollowfication experiments, was responsible for sending this particular human youth into Soul Society, with the result that Kurotsuchi discovered that their knowledge of Quincies was incomplete.

All coincidences were just too overwhelming to remain as mere coincidences any longer. And they were all connected to the Living World and the Gotei officers placed in charge of it. The only real problem he had with the puzzle was he could not sense how the issue of Quincies fit with all the other pieces.

There was only one place where he would be able to find all the missing pieces to complete the puzzle, and the bridges to close the missing gaps in logic.

Shunsui finished his bottle with one final swig, then placed it on the roof tile where he knew it would be discreetly collected. His brows rose momentarily when his gaze landed on the second bottle, still unopened.

He had not needed it this time.

Smiling to himself, he picked up the new bottle nonetheless, then rose to his feet, replacing Katen Kyoukotsu in his obi as he did so, then leapt into shunpo, heading south towards the Central Forty-Six Compound. 

# # # # # #

Repairs had begun to the front gates of the Central Forty-Six Compound. With all members of the Chamber dead, security measures had been completely disabled for the time being. Shunsui easily slipped unseen past the workers, especially past Sasakibe-san and Soi Fon, who were personally overseeing the repairs.

He smirked mirthlessly at the sight of the pair. Sly, wily Yama-jii had lost no time to seize the opportunity to reinsert the First and Second Divisions into the security protocols of the Chamber’s territory. Shunsui would have done the same himself. And he had to admit, the jii-sama could not have chosen a better combination. One was a completely stiff-necked black-and-white minded sharp-eyed rule follower given only to emotions when her cat woman predecessor was involved, the other was old enough, astute enough and tactful enough to rein in any unnecessary over-the-top militant execution of Yama-jii’s orders.

Tightly cloaking his reiatsu, Shunsui skirted past the crews and bounded unseen along the top of the Compound’s perimeter walls until he reached the courtyard of the Daireishokairou. Guards had not yet been reinstated here as well, and the main entrance of the sentient repository was deserted. He lightly dropped down beside the oversized doors.

He stood studying the towering twin dark panels for a heartbeat. The entrance was massive. Yama-jii had it enlarged from its original size after Komamura-san was promoted to taichou, so even the giant wolfman could now walk through it while keeping perfectly upright. Access to the repository within was a privileged tool of duty, given only to Gotei taichou and fukutaichou, and Chamber members and scribes. It had begun as a part of Yama-jii’s personal library, but now it was a limitless physical library containing all knowledge and history of Soul Society. Ever since then, it had served the new government of Soul Society in its shining new capital right here, in the heart of the Seireitei. Unto today, its collections were still growing, for Yama-jii made laws mandating that all who worked for Soul Society continue to contribute to the expanding libraries within. Librarians and administrators were contributed equally by the Gotei and the Chamber on a random rotation schedule. And the Onmitsukidou ran an efficient and extremely tight security system on the whole building and outfit, even regulating and screening all its rostered personnel before they were allowed to even walk through these massive doors. These complicated procedures were encapsulated in a set of seamless laws which Yama-jii had Jyuushirou draft before their old sensei enacted them with the mandate of the Soul King. Nothing had changed after one and a half thousand years, or as far as Shunsui was aware of.

Which was why he knew he had no excuse for his current unfamiliarity with the reiatsu locks humming over the entire height and breadth of the massive entrance. The lock was more complicated than the ones he was used to, and he was used to  _many_  complicated locks in his lifetime. Silently rehearsing the incantation in his mind, he revised the cadence and inflexion of each word of the unlocking spell to ensure he had it correct. He was a Kidou Expert, but when a spell was made by Kidou Masters, as this one was, it would take him a while. Especially when he had not used it for decades. History and the arcane were never his forte. He had always managed by sending his fukutaichou to research or find information he needed, the last two being Lisa and Nanao-chan. More often than not, he simply asked the true master of the repository for help, and Jyuushirou’s personal soft spot for him usually gave him what he wanted immediately. Thus for as long as the Daireishokairou existed, Shunsui never entered it for any purpose other than to take Jyuushirou away from it.

But now, the urgency of his instincts spared him no time to fetch his soul brother, and the reason for his visit was not something he could share with Nanao-chan. Thus relying on his memory of the unlocking spell, he settled on a few likely cadences for the incantation and attempted the most possible one.

Reaching out his hand, he laid his palm on the vibrations of the reiatsu locks and carefully, chanted under his breath.

To his relief, he got it right on the first try. The energy obstacle parted aside like a curtain for him. Exhaling the breath he had been holding, he pushed on the wooden panel and followed it through the threshold, the door smoothly swinging inwards without a sound.

As he stepped into the hushed, vast columnar space within the building, he physically felt an invisible attention swivel and focus on him. He paused, allowing the door to swing shut behind him on its built-in mechanism as he stood in the foyer to let his eyes adjust to the relative dimness inside. As soon as his vision adapted, his sight immediately rested on the wide thoroughfare leading from where he was standing straight through the heart of the cavernous hall, ending directly opposite him at the foot of the massive, white Sekkiseki column rising from the flat stone floor. It soared vertically up into the shadows overhead, its upper limit lost into the darkness above, indistinguishable from the unseen ceilings of the hall. Shunsui never recalled ever seeing those impossibly high ceilings from the inside, even though he had seen the roof of the Daireishokairou plenty times from its outside.

Tracing his eyes down the pure white stone column to ground level again, his gaze stopped at the brown, nondescript door set in its base, directly facing the main entrance where he still stood. On either side of him and all along the sides of the wide thoroughfare, tall massive shelves spread outwards into the cavernous hall, arranged in concentric rings around the central white column. The shelves had grown taller than he remembered, the height of three men now instead of two men, emitting the dull humming of preservation kidou spells.

Despite his long absence from this place, the sensation of the ageless, omnipresent and omniscient being felt as he remembered it: not quite alive, but entirely sentient, clearly showing its intent.

Its intent now was to observe him dispassionately. As if he was a stranger, not someone who had once visited it fairly regularly. He felt as though the unseen entity did not know him, as if it had  _forgotten_  him and their past altercations.

That unexpected response discomfited him to the point where he felt his fine hairs start to rise.

He contemplated the innocuous-looking door as it continued to sit unperturbed on the opposite end of the thoroughfare. It had not changed since the last time he saw it. Beyond it, resided the Daireishin, the immortal omnipresent and omniscient scribe of Soul Society and the living sentient mind in control of this entire building. The mind which did  _not_  forget anything. Absolutely  _nothing_  could be kept from the Daireishin, nor be forgotten by it. It saw into every thought and every emotion, and observed every deed and every single thing that occurred in Soul Society, all at the same time, all the time. Once it inscribed an observation into its circuits, that observation became a permanent, indelible truth. Yama-jii created its consciousness from his own reiryoku, but for it to pull off these kami-like feats, he merged it with the forces that created and maintained the reality of Soul Society, its space, its time, its reishi, and powered it with the elemental energies that gave Soul Society its existence and substance. The end result was an immortal sentient being which was connected to reality and time, and it could freely look backwards and forwards into time and populate its circuits with transcripts of what it saw. The exact limits of the Daireishin archives were unknown, and unquantifiable. The only thing that they could be certain of was that it knew immeasurably much more than the already fathomless knowledge contained out here in the library halls. If something could not be found in those archives, then it did not exist in Soul Society.

Thus the only way for the Daireishin to have forgotten Shunsui, was if its circuits contained no record of him. Which was an impossibility by itself. The library halls of the Daireishokairou were made freely accessible to the top echelons of their government, but those who had access to the Daireishin archives could be counted on the fingers of two hands. For the very power which made it what it was, also emitted a lethal consuming force. To even pass through that door and go inside, a soul had to be strong enough or die a slow, horrible, soul-destroying death from being utterly absorbed alive, never to return to the cycle to be reborn. It was a death that was final, with absolutely nothing left. Yama-jii placed reiatsu locks on that door to protect over-ambitious fools from killing themselves rather than to prevent unauthorised entries. There was a time when more than half of the Gotei taichou-class shinigami had reiryoku immense enough to withstand the hunger of the Daireishin, and they had followed a duty roster to act as reiatsu shields for Chamber members who needed to consult it. That number had now dwindled to only four, namely Yama-jii, Hanshi-sama, Jyuushirou and Shunsui himself, for none had subsequently surfaced who was strong enough.

So if someone had broken in to wipe the Daireishin’s memory of Shunsui, that intruder was long gone. Consumed into non-existence.

But surely something must have had happened in there to cause this.

Controlling his nerves, Shunsui cast his gaze about in a sweeping search pattern as he took a moment to think and order his thoughts.

He had come here to verify his hunches regarding Aizen’s crimes. So he would start from that point and hopefully, find answers along the way to explain the Daireishin’s strange reaction to him.

So if he were Aizen, and he had control of the Chamber for a whole month without anyone’s knowledge, what would he do? Obviously, the top priority would be to discover as many of his enemy’s secrets as possible. In this case, the Gotei’s secrets. However, as Aizen was escaping to Hueco Mundo, he had disdainfully looked down at Jyuushirou and announced that he would become a kami. Thus it would make sense to also examine the library sections on the kami of Soul Society.

He returned his gaze over the dim distance to the dark wooden door of Daireishin archives. The most efficient way to have all his questions answered would be to consult it. Its observations and recordings would reveal all of Aizen’s thoughts and deeds once a search on the traitor was performed on its circuits. However, Aizen had shown himself to be extremely meticulous and patient for over a century, and Shunsui would have to be thorough in his scouting.

It made no difference if he began his scouting from left or right. Thus turning right at random, Shunsui left the main thoroughfare to begin walking down the outermost concentric ring of towering giant shelves, sweeping his reiatsu outwards in a wide circular sensing field as the scent of old paper and preservation kidou spells tickled his senses. The tall massive shelves brimmed end-to-end with books, scrolls, labelled boxes and glass cases containing all kinds of artefacts, the sections of the shelves parsed at intervals with reading desks lit by kidou reading lamps and paired with comfortable reading chairs. Once, Jyuushirou had explained that the Daireishin could create its own dimensions within its physical building in order to continually house the growing amount of knowledge in its safekeeping. Something about how the Sekkiseki stone of the archives column blocked out the sentient entity’s lethal energies, but left this entire building under the control of the Daireishin as an extension of itself. Only vaguely did Shunsui still remember the mechanics, for his attention during that explanation had been thoroughly distracted by the glow of Jyuushirou’s eyes and skin as he spoke avidly about a subject he loved.

Now, as Shunsui walked and scanned, he detected a variety of reiatsu signatures, most of them strange to him. _Chamber members,_ he surmised with sardonic observation. _And probably their scribes._ So much for Yama-jii creating the Daireishin to serve the Gotei and the Chamber equally.

Their two separate powers were meant to be bound by a system of checks and balances against each other to revolve around an impartial core of truth as the final arbiter of justice in Soul Society. The Chamber was to consult the archives when it issued judgements and made new laws, the Gotei was to use the archives to verify decrees and laws before it executed orders and enforced the mandates. Yama-jii used to lecture about the importance of the Daireishin in preventing either faction from falsifying facts to overstep boundaries or scheme to usurp and draw Soul Society into another civil war. He had even voluntarily relinquished his dominion as the highest decision-maker of Soul Society and restricted his influence solely to the Gotei to allow his new governing system to flourish. All admirable goals and deeds, and though the veracity of the Daireishin had helped them keep order and peace in Soul Society for over a thousand years, not everything had been smooth-sailing. Yama-jii had ruthlessly used Jyuushirou’s talents and skill to realise his brainchild. While Shunsui respected that ambition, he always thought that the jii-sama should also have been a little more pragmatic in his expectations of the outcome. Since it was now clear, in the end, that it was the Chamber which used the repository more frequently than the Gotei. An outcome which was far from the original ideal.

Completing his sweep of the first concentric ring without encountering any reiatsu of concern, Shunsui emerged back into the main thoroughfare feeling a little relieved that he found nothing alarming. He moved quickly to the second outermost ring to begin his sweep, hoping that, too, would throw up nothing.

Shortly, he completed his sweep of the second concentric ring without any worrying discovery, and the knot in his sternum began to loosen a tad.

Encouraged, he began his sweep of the third concentric ring. And it was here, when he was barely a quarter into it, that he began to identify familiar presences among the lingering traces of Chamber members: Yama-jii, Hanshi-sama, Byakuya-kun, Hitsugaya-kun, and unsurprisingly, very old traces of Kisuke-kun and Kurotsuchi, the two most avid researchers among the younger taichou of the Gotei. The metallic reiatsu signature of Kurotsuchi jumped out at him as he approached one section, the track as fresh as from last night. It felt anxious. Worried. Spilling forth from a lingering mechanical hollow sensation that could only be left behind by a reiatsu-concealing gadget. Peering at the titles in that section, Shunsui saw that they were all about Quincies.

Seemed that their run-in last night had rattled the irascible scientist enough to burn the midnight oil on the subject, Shunsui mused with a smidgen of satisfaction. _Let’s hope he found something to answer my tingly senses about Quincies._

Moving on, he soon approached the middle of the third ring, placing him diagonally opposite of the main entrance of the Daireishokairou. He quickened his pace when he once again encountered Kurotsuchi’s reiatsu, though it was older this time. Almost a century older. As Kurotsuchi’s signature grew stronger, another signature encroached on Shunsui’s senses.

 _Aizen,_ he identified immediately.

This was the first time Shunsui was encountering Aizen’s presence in the library halls. Quickly, he followed its trail and arrived at where the signature felt the most concentrated. A glance at the titles on the shelves told him that he had arrived at the section where the history of Soul Society and the Soul King were kept.

So Aizen was researching into the Soul King.

The ages of the reiatsu tracks, however, raised the hairs on the back of his neck. They ranged from _more than_ a hundred years old, to as old as _four hundred years_ ago.

It meant that Aizen had been researching into the history of Soul Society and the Soul King _way_ _before_ his last century of scheming.

Quickly moving on to the fourth and fifth rings, Shunsui completed his sweep and found more traces of Aizen’s reiatsu signatures in the sections on politics and law, all of the tracks there also aged between one to four centuries old. By the time he emerged back in the main thoroughfare, he was baffled.

For all of Aizen’s apparent ambition to become a kami, there was no trace of his reiatsu in the section on the kami of Soul Society. Indeed, there was no trace of Aizen’s reiatsu anywhere in the libraries except in the sections on the Soul King, the history of Soul Society, and studies of politics and law. All his reiatsu tracks in the libraries were concentrated on these few subjects of completely mortal concerns.

Instincts strumming into high alert, he swung his eyes towards the innocuous-looking door to the Daireishin.

It was the only place left to investigate.

He had emerged at the end of the innermost ring of shelves, standing only a few strides away from the massive Sekkiseki column. He could feel the omniscient power of the sentient being emanating through even those reiatsu-cancelling stones, which had only ever been able to filter out the lethal effects of the Daireishin’s ceaseless thirst for knowledge.

Since he was currently alone with himself, he had to face the truth. He detested the Daireishin. As useful as it was to Soul Society, he would never see it as anything more than a terrible detriment to Jyuushirou. Shunsui never consulted it. He refused to after his first interaction with the thing. That first meeting was an outright confrontation. He had charged in, forcibly broken its thrall on Jyuushirou’s mind and its grasp on Jyuushirou’s power, and physically carried his zombified and drained soul brother out of that structure, out of this very building and out of the very compound of this repository, as far away as he could from this greedy ceaseless hunger which forever sought to deplete Jyuushirou’s precious reiryoku. All of Shunsui’s subsequent interactions with the Daireishin had been equally antagonistic, all of them involving Shunsui showing up for the sole purpose of depriving the thing of its most desired source of power. Its intent towards him now should be one of animosity if not outright hostility. Not this apathetic observation, as if it had forgotten the acrimony between them.

But if Aizen had done something to it, Shunsui would have to put his personal feelings aside.

Swallowing his distaste, he strode the remainder of the way to the ordinary-looking door and stared down at its plain unremarkable doorknob. There were no visible locks anywhere, but there was no necessity for them. There was no keyhole either, for that artifice was also unnecessary. The only security was the reiatsu lock sealing the door against fools, and as he probed it with his senses to search for his own reiatsu signature, the living force behind the lock suddenly reared, banging against the locking spell with jarring frequencies that vibrated to his bones, its intent towards him suddenly transforming from indifference to deadly enmity.

Suspicions rising, Shunsui searched deeper. And found no trace of his own reiatsu signature. He ranged his search out a little more, and likewise found no trace of the reiatsu signatures of Yama-jii and Hanshi-sama. Like his own, they were gone.

He retracted his senses as his alarm rose into a near-panic, even as comprehension dawned

The Daireishin had not recognised him when he arrived, and now sought to repel him as an unknown intruder, simply because Shunsui’s reiatsu signature was missing from the lock. Someone had erased it. When Yama-jii first installed the reiatsu lock, as soon as the spell merged with the Daireishin’s energies to become part of the sentient entity, the Daireishin had pushed its memory of Shunsui’s signature into the locking spell so that it would recognise him and grant him access. It had done the same for every Gotei elder who had ever been given access, including Yama-jii and Hanshi-sama. But with their signatures erase, if either of them were to attempt to unlock this door right now, they would both be greeted with this same lethal intent.

Forcibly ignoring the hostility emanating from the living force, Shunsui shielded his reiryoku then reached out one hand towards the doorknob, extending his reiatsu to examine the turning mechanism.

Six reiatsu traces bumped against him at once, all nearly a month old, all of them unfamiliar, except for one which Shunsui identified after a few heartbeats as belonging to Chief Justice Furukawa Souta… or rather, the _late_ Chief Justice, since all members of the Central Forty-Six Chamber were now murdered and dead. Then, as he suspected, he felt the seventh signature on the reiatsu lock.

 _Aizen_.

It had no business being there at all. Yama-jii had not granted new access to the Daireishin for hundreds of years. Least of all to Aizen.

Then Shunsui detected what was grating at his senses from beneath Aizen’s signature.

Discordant and harsh, the underlying energies of the lock were twisting, contorting to beyond recognition, hammering riotously against his probing senses. Gritting his teeth against the uncomfortable sensation, he tracked it, and his blood turned cold when he felt them extend inwards and disappear into the looming presence of the entity beyond the door, into the archives.

Breaking the connection, he withdrew his hand and stepped back, his heartbeat racing with stark, terrible realisation.

Aizen had not only removed their access to the lock, he had also tampered with the lock itself. Among all who ever had access to this door, Shunsui understood the Daireishin the least. But even he knew that the only way Aizen could have done what he did was if he had successfully gained access and learnt operations of the Daireishin circuits, and performed these alterations right from within the core of the Daireishin itself. Even worse, Aizen had survived the experience and emerged alive and well and full of power to taunt the entire Gotei with a dramatic escape to Hueco Mundo.

The implications were nothing short of frightening.

Surviving the sentient presence was the ultimate acid test of a shinigami’s power. Every shinigami knew this. A shinigami might be born with a vast immense reiryoku, but it would still take a thousand years before that innate power matured and transcended into the next level to be strong enough to resist the Daireishin. Aizen was not much older than five hundred years, around Yoruichi’s age. Unless, of course, the traitor had also faked his age along with faking everything else.

Shunsui inhaled a deep steadying breath and pulled the brim of his hat lower over his face. It was now clear to him why Aizen’s reiatsu tracks in the libraries had been so specific and limited.

The traitor had known that what he was seeking would not be found in the library halls, but within the archives. Evidently, he had spent centuries accumulating enough power to enter the Daireishin. Like all high-ranking commanders of the Gotei, Aizen knew very well the dangers of the entity. It had the infamy of mercilessly consuming friend and foe alike if it found its user’s power even slightly lacking, until the very mention of its name struck horror into hearts. Threatening a suspect with calling upon the Daireishin as witness was often enough to extract an immediate confession. Aizen had heeded all these whisperings, and had triumphed over them.

Closing his eyes momentarily, Shunsui cast his senses out to give the area a final sweep.

Two other signatures came to him immediately, and he knew he would have noticed them sooner if he had not been so engrossed in tracking Aizen. They were painstakingly cloaked, but their cloaking skills were no match for Shunsui. He peeled apart the shields and identified the very recent, very distinct signatures of Ichimaru Gin and Tousen Kaname.

So those two had been here as well. Recently. Repeatedly. Standing in the exact spot as he was, right before the door to the Daireishin. Faithful as dogs to Aizen.

Dejection filled Shunsui. But there truly was no help for it now. As much as he hated it, he had no other choice but to get Jyuushirou here immediately and commence a probe. With all three of them now locked out, his soul brother was their only remaining recourse to obtain the answers they desperately needed to turnaround the mess Aizen had left behind.

“What have you found?”

The sudden gravelly voice startled him.

Whipping around, he saw Yama-jii walk into view from behind the last shelf of the fourth ring, carrying his gnarled stick instead of supporting himself with it.

“Heh, Yama-jii! Lying in ambush and masking yourself to catch me unawares?” he complained, settling his nerves.

“I arrived not long after you. But decided to watch you.” His old sensei drew abreast and finally allowed himself to make a noise by dropping the end of his stick to the floor with a soft thump. Then he repeated his question, “What have you found?”

Shunsui sighed. Setting aside his ire, he schooled his thoughts and emotions and gave his full account as he had always done as a taichou, beginning from his hunches last night, and ending with his recent findings. He deliberately left out his macabre discovery in Kurotsuchi’s tanks.

“This explains why Mayuri was so agitated last evening,” rumbled Yama-jii thoughtfully. “And even more agitated this morning. I had assumed he was being paranoid as usual when I spied him come in here.” Then his red eyes sharpened. “Aizen was interested in the Soul King, you say?”

“Mayuri _is_ paranoid, but this time his paranoia actually matches a cause,” Shunsui commented, then gestured despondently at the archives’ door. “And yes to your question. I’m certain once we regain access through there, we’ll find corroborative evidence of Aizen’s interest in the Soul King and Soul Society’s politics and law for a long while. His reiatsu signatures out here on these subjects are already nearly four centuries old.”

“And you are certain one of the reiatsu signatures on the lock belongs to Chief Justice Furukawa Souta?” Yama-jii asked with curious intensity.

Shunsui spared him a speculative look. Then he indicated the doorknob. “You can sense them for yourself, Yama-jii.”

Yama-jii grunted and strode forwards, holding out his gnarled palm to hover over the doorknob.

Shunsui could not remember any moment in his life when he had seen Yama-jii look shocked. But the expression rising on the wizened face could only be described as such.

“What now?” he asked trepidatiously.

The red eyes were widened. “The tampering runs deep. My seals are gone.”

“What? Wait a moment, Aizen erased your reiatsu signature because he must have sensed it when he was breaching the lock. But how did he know about your seals?” Shunsui did not know the exact mechanics, but he at least knew about those seals. “Ukitake and you assimilated those seals right into the reishi of the physical structure of this thing, like in these Sekkiseki stones, this door, and this reiatsu lock. They shouldn't have been detectable by anyone but either of you.”

Yama-jii held his palm closer, his red eyes momentarily unfocused as he searched deeper. His entire mien darkened. “Aizen’s tampering runs deep. The distortions in the lock run directly into the core of the Daireishin.” His heavy white browed gaze narrowed. “And I know the other five signatures well. They belong to all the other five judges of the Chamber.”

“But that makes even less sense,” Shunsui frowned, thinking aloud. “If Aizen was after the secrets of the Gotei and the Chamber, why would he break in with the very ones he was spying on? And he knows as well as the rest of us that the judges would die once they enter.”

Standing back, Yama-jii stared ominously at the innocuous wooden door. “I fear to think what this implies. The only way to remove any one of my seals is to make fundamental changes to the Daireishin itself, from right inside its heart. I was at the Underground Assembly Hall last evening and again this dawn to discover what else could be learnt before Retsu moves out the corpses. There were only forty corpses in there. The six judges were all missing, and there was no sign that they had left their stations under force. So I came here to find answers. Now with what you have discovered, I am quite certain that the six judges are still inside, dead and their remains in the process of being absorbed into the atmosphere within. With their weak reiryoku, they would not survive the core’s power.”

“What’s worrying me is how Aizen gained so much power to pull this off.” Shunsui might nurse a grudge against the sentient entity, and still some personal ire at Yama-jii, but he knew his duty well enough to set aside his private feelings for the moment. “And how he knew of the existence of your seals, and how he knew to remove them.”

“We must have these questions answered.” Yama-jii’s red eyes flashed. “The seals protect the circuits against my reiatsu so that the Daireishin will allow me to operate it. Without them, if I force entry inside, it will defend itself against my power and cause this whole building to explode. The loss to Soul Society will be unimaginable. I cannot touch the archives until this is set right.”

Shunsui rubbed a hand over his face. Soon after it awakened, the thing behind the door had inexplicably rebelled against its creator. It was not until Yama-jii had roped in Jyuushirou’s aid that the jii-sama regained access to it. For reasons known only to the entity, and perhaps kami, from the very first moment the Daireishin encountered his soul brother’s reiatsu, it had regarded Jyuushirou’s power as part of the elemental energies from which it was birthed, as part of itself. Ever since then, it responded to Jyuushirou as if it was responding to its own intent, with the result that his soul brother could accomplish feats with the sentient being that even Yama-jii could not. Such as never needing any access right or lock to enter and operate the Daireishin, never leaving any track in it, and never be visible to its perpetual omnipresent observation. Since his reiryoku first erupted when he was thirteen years old, Jyuushirou had gone unrecorded by that omnipresent watcher. Yama-jii, even Jyuushirou himself, rejoiced and called it their strategic advantage. Shunsui could only see it as Jyuushirou being cruelly left out of history.

All these meant that for as long as Yama-jii could not touch the archives, Jyuushirou would have to be the one to do it.

“Clearly, Aizen means to stop us from following his tracks,” Yama-jii was saying. Then his red gaze narrowed with a vicious gleam. “Let him believe he has succeeded. He does not know everything. Kami not only gave me Jyuushirou, it also gave me victory against all opposition to keep him, and the foresight to keep his connection to the Daireishin hidden. Once your brother enters and starts a probe, we will knowing Aizen’s full motives and have a full accounting of his deeds before the traitorous whelp even realises.” Confidence shone fiercely in his wizened old face.

Memories of his conversation with Jyuushirou last night rose to the fore of Shunsui’s mind. He raised a brow at their old sensei and ventured, “You aren’t angry with Ukitake anymore?”

The ancient red gaze blazed momentarily. “Did you think I ever was?”

Shunsui was incredulous. “I saw your handprint on his flesh with my own eyes! You don’t even raise your voice at him, and you’ve _never_ hit him hard enough to leave a bruise like that!”

A loud thump of the gnarled walking stick resounded through the cavernous halls. “And do you suppose I should let him go without punishment? There has been enough talk for enough centuries that I show favouritism to both of you. Destroying the Soukyoku is a crime of the highest order. When committed by a senior taichou against a Chamber edict, especially by the one all of Soul Society believe is my favourite, in the eyes of the public a death sentence is justified. If I had let your brother go without a scratch, I would have publicly contravened my own rules and given our political enemies a new leverage against me.”

“So it was all a ruse? Yama-jii, if you never had such an intent, you certainly hid it very well yesterday when you were beating us,” Shunsui argued bleakly. “Ukitake was convinced you meant to kill us. You know how well he can sense intent. Tell me now, what would you have done if Hanshi-sama had not exposed Aizen in time and informed us all?”

Yama-jii stared at him, his red eyes burning. “As I told Retsu and you yesterday, there are developments which neither of you nor the rest of the Gotei know. I kept from everyone, including you, the true nature of the burden I placed on Jyuushirou during the last three centuries. So I shall forgive your tone of voice, your ignorance and your accusation. But never forget that I taught both of you myself, and the pains I took to keep your brother with us. I know far better than you what his body can and cannot withstand. Yes, I made that blow to look worse than it is.” Then his glare turned meaningful. “I felt his reiatsu release last night and early this dawn. Clearly, he has recovered speedily, would you not say?”

Mollified, and a little embarrassed that their adoptive father had understood the intimate nature of their reiatsu releases, Shunsui looked away. The infamous Yamamoto Soutaichou of the Gotei Thirteen did not express soft feelings, but it did not mean he did not understand them. But still, Shunsui was not entirely appeased. The memory of Yama-jii’s handprint on Jyuushirou’s pale vulnerable flesh persisted starkly in his mind.

“You know, Yama-jii,” he began conversationally. “Every time I went inside this thing, it was to break the Daireishin’s hold on Ukitake and take him away before he became too drained to keep his illness back. And after each time, I spent a whole month at his bedside to get him back on his feet. He needs every bit of his reiryoku to sustain himself so that he doesn’t relapse. He can’t afford to spare any power to this thing. I never liked it. But I know we have no other option now than to rely on him to deal with it. Are you certain what we need him to do now won’t bring him down again? He’s been well for thirty years ever since you stopped involving him in your secret work.”

“You rascal, how you forget,” Yama-jii’s gravel voice was steely. “When I found Jyuushirou, he had lost control and called down a storm that ransacked all of Soul Society in one night. Yet none of the Gotei or our allies believed he would be of any use to us, simply because of how ill he was. I used our scarce resources to barter for him from his lady mother, I fought against great opposition from our allies and even my own taichou to keep him. I withstood the entire barrage for centuries to shield him from those who would cast him out to die. Only Retsu and Choujirou understood and stood by me. You saw this yourself. And you now presume that I do not know your older brother’s abilities?”

“It didn’t look that way to me for three centuries,” Shunsui replied quietly. Then he turned and looked directly into those red eyes, and abruptly saw that hurt had mixed with anger in those wizened red eyes. Gentling his tone, he pointed out softly, “Yama-jii, he needs your reassurance. You know how much he loves you and respects you. But he doesn’t get enough direct affection from you. After what happened yesterday, perhaps it’s time to change how you relate to him?”

The red eyes continued glaring at Shunsui for several more heartbeats, then the anger began to dim. Yama-jii’s reply, when it came, was an indistinct grunt.

Shunsui supposed that was as good as he would get from his obstinate old sensei for the time being.

Yama-jii turned away and began thumping steadily towards the exit. Shunsui slowly trudged after him, keeping a wary distance from that obstinate fiery soul.

“Jyuushirou co-created the Daireishin with me,” echoed back the gravelly words as the wizened hunched form thumped on ahead. “You will never find a finer construct than this in Soul Society past, present or in future. Your brother knows his creation as well as I, but his mastery over it has long ago surpassed mine. Yet unlike you, he understands and accepts that the needs and sentiments of many outstrip the needs and feelings of one individual. I will not tolerate any more accusations from you that I am ill-using my own son. And I forbid you to call the Daireishin a thing. I barely awakened it when it learnt to be fussy and decided to choose which reiryoku it wanted. It decided that I, its creator and parent, have a reiatsu too harsh and blunt for its tastes, and it repelled my every attempt to work with it. Then it decided that I was a threat and started to self-destruct whenever I touched it. I was furious-no, I was livid. So you tell me now, is the Daireishin an inanimate thing, or a being with its own awareness?”

Yama-jii had seen right into him. And if Shunsui were truly honest with himself, he knew his old sensei was right. The problem lay with Shunsui, not the circumstances of Jyuushirou’s birth and life. Of the four of them, only he, Shunsui, had never fully accepted the consequences of their responsibilities and positions on his frail soul brother. He had never revealed his true feelings on this to Jyuushirou, but he could not hide them from his old sensei, for the wily old fox had raised and taught him, after all.

“That, I won’t argue with,” Shunsui finally gave in. “I know it has its own mind and personality. It probably knows I don’t like it and the feeling’s mutual. Sorry to disappoint you, Yama-jii, but you’re going to have to accept that your second son and your pet creation will never get along.”

“Never say never. The day you will need the power of the Daireishin may come sooner than you think.” Then with noticeable softening of his gravelly tone, Yama-jii ordered, “Send for Jyuushirou, and Retsu. We cannot wait until this evening to convene. We will discuss this now. My chashitsu. In one hour.” With a final thump of his walking stick, the hunched old figure pushed against the oversized doors and stepped out into the morning sunshine.

Only the three of them shared tea with Yama-jii in his personal chashitsu. Wordlessly Shunsui obeyed, trailing behind at a good distance as he summoned for his Jigokuchou. 

Silently, he realised that Yama-jii had not actually answered his question of what he would have done if Hanshi-sama had not exposed Aizen in time yesterday. But Shunsui decided it was futile to pry.

# # # # # #

The tallest rooftop of the Twelfth Division was the perfect vantage point for locating its taichou. Shunsui had less than an hour to spare but it would be time enough to gauge the mood of the Seireitei’s irascible resident scientist. Thus he was rather surprised to see Kurotsuchi leave the Twelfth Division and break into shunpo towards the direction Shunsui had just come from, which was the south, where the First Division and Central Forty-Six Compound lay.

Silently he followed, fully cloaking his reiatsu for good measure. He preferred not to repeat his experience last night of being discovered before he was ready to reveal himself.

Kurotsuchi was holding a thin file in one hand and muttering to himself under his breath as he flash-stepped from roof to roof. His speed was no challenge for Shunsui to keep up with, but his ability to read and shunpo at the same time without colliding into anything or taking a misstep was admirable.

As the engrossed scientist drew near the territory of the First Division, Shunsui sped up on impulse, intent on venting a little of his residual ire at Yama-jii on his unaware, testy colleague.

He deliberately, and suddenly, peeled open a notch in his reiatsu shield.

“Haarrgghh!” The squawk from Kurotsuchi was hilariously undignified, the thin file almost falling from his chalky blue-nailed hands.

“Going to see Yama-jii again?” Shunsui tipped the brim of his hat jauntily.

The ruffled scientist dropped to a stop onto a precarious-looking perch. Shunsui stepped down onto a safer spot, and a glance around told him they were balanced on top of the inner boundary walls separating the Second Division from the First.

“So what if I am?” Kurotsuchi demanded. “I don’t see anyone else investigating.”

Investigating…? _Oh._

So Kurotsuchi believed he was helping to investigate their new human allies.

“I felt your reiatsu traces in the Daireishokairou. You haven’t slept all night?” Shunsui asked with some concern. Genius or not, no one could function without sleep.

In Kurotsuchi’s case, sleep deprivation could mean the difference between a brilliant solution or a fatal disaster for the Seireitei.

The golden eyes narrowed suspiciously. “What were you doing there? Following me?”

“Following up on my own hunches,” Shunsui placated. “Now, now, Mayuri-san, don’t be like that. We serve the Gotei together. If you feel there’s a real problem that needs to be heard by Yama-jii, I can help.”

The painted skeletal face looked undecided for a moment, then suddenly hardened in decision.

“Is it still on?” Kurotsuchi demanded.

Shunsui drew a blank. “Is what still on?”

Those lipless, exposed teeth gnashed in impatience, somehow managing to look even more like a grinning skull. Shunsui suppressed a shudder.

“Your offer.”

He looked vacantly at Kurotsuchi.

Irritation flashed across the black-and-white painted skeletal face. “Do you have goldfish memory? Last night you offered me the aid of, quote, the dulcet voice of your older brother, unquote.” Blue-nailed fingers made quotation marks in the air. Then the lidless golden eyes narrowed. “Or have you recanted?”

Oh. _That_.

“I apologise, much has happened since we spoke last night,” Shunsui said sincerely, but his mind was whirling rapidly. “I do recall, however, that I offered it in exchange for information.”

“Fine!” Kurotsuchi snapped. “I’ll tell you how the Quincy boy defeated me and-”

“See, this is where I’ve run into a little problem,” Shunsui interrupted. “Shall we?” Without waiting for a reply, he turned towards the low warehouses at the back of the First Division and leapt into shunpo, leaving Kurotsuchi to pursue at his heels.

In three large strides, Shunsui landed on one low roof. It was a storage area, quiet at this time of the day. Briefly, he scanned around with his reiatsu.

Good, they had no eavesdroppers.

Kurotsuchi appeared several minutes later, managing to still look impatient even when clearly winded from chasing after Shunsui.

“My original question is now useless, it seems,” Shunsui began without preamble, not giving the scientist a chance to catch his breath. “Once Yama-jii hears your report about the Quincies, it will become known by all of the Gotei. My return favour from you will soon become useless, I fear. No, I would like another piece of information from you. One that no one else can know.”

“What information?” Kurotsuchi asked immediately, admirably without showing his breathlessness.

 _Desperate, are we?_ Shunsui mused silently. Aloud, he said, “I wish to know everything about those organs in your tanks and what you do with them.”

Kurotsuchi looked surprised for a moment. “Since when are you interested in science?”

“Hey, hey, no questions now. A trade is a trade.”

“Fine!” Kurotsuchi snapped, then added slyly, “I won’t tell you everything because you won’t be able to understand everything. I’ll tell you what you’re capable of understanding. Acceptable?”

That sounded fair. Shunsui knew he had a far from adequate grasp of scientific terms and reasoning. He nodded in agreement.

Kurotsuchi raised his hand. “See this? If I cut off this arm, I can grow another in a few seconds with an injection of my Hojiku-Zai serum. It’s very painful but it works like a charm, there’s no rejection and the new arm works like the original was never cut off. But if I lose an organ, I can’t do an injection immediately on the battlefield. Growing a new organ needs the body to reroute its life support system and you can’t do that in the middle of fighting. So I’ve devised a way to grow my spare organs first, then perform a transplant before going into battle. When I return, I transplant back my originals.”

Shunsui grimaced at the images the descriptions were conjuring up. “An organ transplant sounds very painful, Mayuri-san. Why do you subject yourself to it twice? Can’t you keep using the new organs and transplant back the originals only the next time you need them?”

“Not yet, I can’t.” Kurotsuchi was surprisingly honest. “The spares I create now can function well for half a year at most. Six months after the transplant, they start to fail until they die at the end of the year. To create true replicas that function like the originals, I’ll need a huge supply of my reiryoku to power the development of the reishi particles. But I can’t spare that much when I have to work. So I’ve begun experiments to create a reiatsu converter and amplifier, it will convert any reiryoku into my own signature before amplifying its strength. I then infuse it into the culture tanks. But I lack enough reiryoku supply to finalise testing of the machine.” His golden eyes suddenly looked calculating. “I’m willing to trade if you can donate me some of your reiryoku to test my amplifier, Kyouraku Taichou.”

“How much reiryoku do you need?”

“Until the development of the organ is complete and successfully tested to be as functional as the original.”

“In other words, you don’t know.”

“Of course I know!" The black-and-white painted face looked thoroughly insulted. "I’m just not certain yet of the exact amount.” One blue nail tapped the golden-coned chin. “But, if you’re willing to help, with your level of reiryoku, and the amplifier, I’ll need an infusion for only about half an hour a day, perhaps even less. The reishi particles have a fixed rate of organisation and to hurry their development will only spoil the organ.”

“Half an hour a day for how many days?”

“For as many days as it takes for the organ to fully and properly mature. Then I’ll transplant the new organs into myself and see if I’ll start to suffer organ failure within half a year.”

Shunsui looked at the mad genius in mild horror. “You’re testing on yourself _again_? What if the experiment doesn’t work?”

“Then I’ll transplant back my original organs and start another trial all over again.”

It was an insane testing procedure, but if Shunsui were to be honest, macabrely admirable. He could see how a successful procedure like this would help the entire Gotei army, make shinigami stronger and near indestructible.

“Assuming you’ve successfully tested on yourself, will you then share this with the Gotei? I can see many applications for your discovery that will help shinigami survive their battles. In fact, your Hojiku-Zai serum should be shared.”

“ _All_ my inventions are meant for mass replication!” Kurotsuchi stressed, his nasally voice scratching into an irate pitch. “Do you think I create them to be private toys? You may not think it, but I _am_ loyal to the Gotei! The only reason I’ve always limited my creations to myself is because mass replication needs more test subjects before they can be safely implemented. I will share if you can find me shinigami who will generously submit themselves to science for the greater good!” Kurotsuchi ended his tirade slightly breathless.

It was an astute but painful observation. The Gotei today was not like the one Shunsui had started with. The virtue of prioritising society over self was now increasingly reversed, and most shinigami these days placed self above society. The advent of individualism and personal glory had led to divisional territoriality and hoarding of skills and secrets, and competition between the younger taichou was invariably ego-driven, setting dismal examples for their subordinates. Even within the same division, rivalry between individuals for the coveted twenty seated positions ran fierce. The Fourth, Thirteenth and Eighth were close and comparatively harmonious only because of the long relationships between their taichou. The Eleventh and the Tenth were grudgingly cooperative with them only because the pink-haired pint-sized Eleventh Division Fukutaichou held special fondness for Jyuushirou, Hanshi-sama, Nanao-chan and Rangiku-chan, in that order. But to ask any of them to subject themselves to science for the sake of the entire Gotei, unless they were facing an imminent threat of extinction, Shunsui very much doubted that even Yama-jii could order anyone to do it.

“This is why I kept the procedure only to myself. Without an adequate variety of reiryoku, I can’t mass replicate it. With the way everyone is around here?” Kurotsuchi snorted in disgust. “Mass replication may never happen. So don’t think about asking me to do it any time soon.”

Shunsui memorised the details of the new knowledge. “This is interesting, and an interesting offer. Thank you, Mayuri-san. Give me some time to think on it. But right now, consider our first deal done. I’ll ensure Yama-jii listens to you regarding your worries about the Quincies.”

“Who says I’m worried? _He_ should be the one to worry!” Kurotsuchi was near apoplectic with denial.

Shunsui waved his hand placatingly. “Right, right, you’re not worried about the Quincies. You’re worried that Yama-jii’s not worried about the Quincies. I get it, I get it. Wait for the good news, ne?” Chuckling, he leapt upwards into shunpo before he could hear any protest or rejoinder.

The new information was giving him new ideas.

**Author's Note:**

> This whole sub-series is undergoing updating right now. It was 99% complete when first posted, but this last 1% is where the devilish details are, yet absolutely essential so that Part 4 will gel in nicely. If you don't wish to wait, all 9 chapters of this 99%-completed work are here: '[ _Defeat Evil With Evil_](https://archiveofourown.org/works/17640359)', which comprises Part 3 of the main series '[ _In All, But Blood_](https://archiveofourown.org/series/1201744)'. Chapter 3 of this sub-series, ' _Fateful Decisions_ ', may not be posted due to time constraints. I'm busy trying to get Part 4 up!
> 
> Or, wondering about the backstories? Then begin from the beginning with Yamamoto's POV in the stage-setting, completed work, '[ _Unforgivable, Regrettable_](https://archiveofourown.org/works/16792792)', which is Part 1 of '[ _In All, But Blood_](https://archiveofourown.org/series/1201744)' , then understand the situation from Unohana's POV as events continue in Part 2 in the completed work, '[ _Heal, To Fight Longer_](https://archiveofourown.org/works/16816840)'.
> 
> THE DISCLAIMER I HATE TO WRITE BUT HAVE TO:
> 
> All characters, plot, devices settings, environments in Bleach (the "Property") belong to Tite Kubo and the companies which created, developed and produced them (the "Copyright Owners"). All parts of the Property used in this fiction are based and developed from the original works of the Copyright Owners and the author of this fiction makes no money and no claim whatsoever on any part of the Property. All ideas, developments and works in this fiction which are not part of the Property (the "Transformations") are made by the author and belong to the author. No money of any kind is made from this work in any way whatsoever. If any of the Copyright Owners wants any part of the Transformations, the author is open to discussions.


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